Let’s be clear, if you’re smoking at Harvard Medical School, you better be on fire. This spring, Harvard Medical School banned all smoking, indoors and out, anywhere on its expansive Longwood campus. That includes the Harvard Dental School and the Harvard School of Public Health. Passive aggressive signs warn potential puffers, ‘Let’s be clear, [This is a] 100 percent smoke free campus.’ Prolific signage features dreary, brooding images of test tubes, microscopes and cigarette smoke. Each one displays a firm but encouraging tagline like ‘Do it for the stats’ and ‘Do it for life.’
Wentworth Institute of Technology is more amiable with its similar smoking policy. ‘Welcome to our tobacco-free campus,’ signs read. ‘Please respect this policy on all campus grounds.’ Both institutions join over 400 colleges and universities nationwide who have enacted strict policies that limit smoking entirely, or with few remote exceptions, according to Americans for Non-Smokers Rights.
Smoking has been extensively researched and it’s no secret that smokers face serious health risks. However, studies by numerous government and academic organizations have shown that secondhand smoke is no less dangerous. Smoke-free policies have proven to improve air quality and reduce adverse health outcomes for both smokers and non-smokers. Secondhand smoke contains the exact same chemicals and nicotine that smokers inhale, and is classified as a known carcinogen by the US National Toxicology Program. Simply put, there is no safe amount of secondhand smoke.
The Boston Public Health Commission banned the sale of cigarettes in pharmacies and on college campuses last year, but does this policy go far enough to protect non-smokers from the hazardous health risks associated with exposure to secondhand smoke? Are Northeastern students who choose not to smoke able to avoid inhaling cigarette smoke in public areas on campus? According to the American Cancer Society, thousands of deaths due to lung cancer and heart disease are associated with secondhand smoke each year. Infections, pneumonia and asthma caused by secondhand smoke are responsible for expensive hospitalizations and unnecessary suffering.
November was Lung Cancer Awareness month. There are numerous, free smoking cessation resources available online and in Boston. University Health and Counseling Services, your doctor or pharmacist, and many national associations all can provide you assistance in breaking the habit. The best way to prevent lung cancer is to not smoke, and if you do smoke, I encourage you to quit, both for your health and for mine. It is time to consider joining our neighboring institutions in providing our students a campus environment that does not include secondhand smoke. Let’s be clear, Northeastern.

‘- Quinn Bott is a middler pharmacy major.
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